Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Monday said that Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei has instructed officials to end the state of "neither war nor peace"
with the United States. "The supreme leader ordered us to end the no-war, no-peace situation," he said, according to Iranian media. "We can negotiate with dignity and resolve the issue with dignity. We favor dialogue and negotiations," the President said. "However, we will not surrender to force and bullying," he added. The statement comes ahead of United States President Donald Trump meeting with the prime minister of Qatar, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani. The two leaders are set to meet in a closed-door setting. Qatar has played a central role as an intermediary between Washington and Tehran, conveying proposals and seeking to bridge differences over Iran's nuclear program and the terms for ending the conflict. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Sunday that negotiations with Iran had made little progress and that he did not see an imminent breakthrough. Speaking before departing Florida for a G7 foreign ministers meeting in Paris, Rubio said Trump preferred a diplomatic solution but described Iran's demands as "unacceptable" and, in some cases, "outrageous and ridiculous, and really not realistic." Trump said Sunday that he was highly unlikely to order new strikes against Iran if negotiations made progress and produced a strong agreement, but warned that the United States had identified additional infrastructure targets, including bridges, should military action resume. Meanwhile, Iran on Monday defended its two-day proposal as the most reasonable offer on the table, after Rubio's remarks. "Is it unreasonable that Iran demands that US illegal sanctions and its naval blockade must be lifted before negotiations start and that the war should end on all fronts?" Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei told a weekly press conference. Iran has made the offer to shorten the time to restart talks from an earlier seven-day proposal, which calls for Washington to first meet conditions including halting hostilities, lifting a blockade and waiving sanctions.
